


bird of prey

by bubbleteabunny



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: F/M, Reader-Insert, reader's got powers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-20
Updated: 2019-03-20
Packaged: 2019-11-26 00:22:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18173393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bubbleteabunny/pseuds/bubbleteabunny
Summary: Diego thought stopping the bank robbery would be nothing more than routine, but you had other plans.It only gets crazier from there.





	bird of prey

It’s a beautiful Monday morning when Mister Crane robs the bank.

The earthy smell of wet asphalt still lingers in the air, the last traces of a rain that had begun last week and continued on through the weekend, pouring from dark thunderclouds hanging low and which, to the particularly superstitious type, were perhaps a sign of foreboding. This dramatic downturn in the weather had been completely unexpected. No forecasts showed rain, much less a rainfall to this degree. Umbrellas have worked overtime the past several days, and fought against an incredible onslaught of wind. They seem to sigh in relief as they’re put away once the clouds finally recede, and the sun greets the city with a welcome wash of warmth.

With his mask on, Mister Crane can’t smell the drying roads. All he can smell is the lavender he’d placed at the end of the beak. It’s there solely because it’s his favorite scent. There were more important reasons for placing herbs in this spot in the past, of course, but it’s not the past. It’s the twenty-first century, not the seventeenth, and there was no miasma to protect himself from.

His only companion for today’s endeavor wears a black gas mask, and the visor, like his own eyepieces, are black, successfully concealing their identities. “Are you ready?” he asks.

Your eyes slide from staring up at the bank with its tall columns to Mister Crane. His words are slightly muffled, but you understood him perfectly well. You nod in response.

Mister Crane grins even though you can’t see it. “Good.” He stretches his hand out. “Shall we?”

You walk up the steps side-by-side and through the double glass doors. A few people pass you on their way out, casting at first confused glances in your direction, and then, like they were able to see the future in the darkened visor of your mask, realization hits them and they rush away from a sight that is sure not to be pretty within the next ten seconds. Neither you nor Mister Crane pays them any mind.

From the duffel bag hanging off his shoulder, Mister Crane produces a gun and aims the barrel at the ceiling. He lets off warning shots, and small bits of stone and plaster crumble and fall to the polished tile floors. Screams bounce off the walls in reaction and he can’t help it: he laughs. It’s music to his ears and he takes in a deep breath like he’ll smell the fresh morning air but he smells lavender which, for him, is just as good.

“This will be over quickly, so long as you cooperate,” he announces, voice raised so everyone can hear him. Suddenly, there’s the sound of a low whirring, and then a translucent blue disc flies past him, colliding with the workspace of a bank teller, scattering papers and frying the terminal. She yelps in shock, and he spots her hastily removing her hand from beneath the desk as she backs away.

Mister Crane raises a brow. You have sharp eyes. She hadn’t been able to press the panic button. He glances over his shoulder at you, several paces behind and another blue disc at the ready. “Thank you.”

He turns his attention to the teller you’d frightened, walking up to her counter and leaning on it casually. He speaks to her in a relaxed tone, as though this were any other day and he was merely here for a routine withdrawal or deposit or what have you, and she was going to assist him with a smile and a polite inquiry as to his wellbeing. Except she isn’t playing her part—she’s shaking and looks on the brink of bursting into tears and if Mister Crane is honest, it’s a little annoying.

“Don’t try to make this any harder than it has to be, darling,” he remarks. The statement is a referral to her attempt to call the police—an action which would make him  _very_ unhappy—as well as a demand for her to be compliant, for he continues on, “The vault. Now.”

The teller nods quickly, not keen on another forcefield coming her way, or a bullet. Mister Crane follows her behind the counter towards the back, casting no instructions back over to you. You don’t need them. All he says is “We’ll be just a moment.” You’re not sure if he’s saying that to her or to you.

Your job while he goes down to the vault is simple, and the people you’re now holding hostage are doing half of it for you. They’re all on the ground, up against walls or cowering beneath desks. Some stare up at the mask covering your face, and some keep their stares down, keeping track of your movements by your boots. If anyone looks suspicious, you don’t hesitate to throw a forcefield their way, missing their fingers or their faces by inches, and you don’t say anything but they get the point: you won’t miss the next time.

As you patrol the floor, occasionally you check outside past the windows for any sign of police. Even if you had stopped that woman from alerting them, by this point, pedestrians outside must have called in. But you don’t yet see the flash of blue and red lights nor hear the siren. You tense up regardless, forcefields humming lowly in your grasp, because you’ve learned to trust your gut, and your gut is telling you that despite the lack of telltale signs that anyone has arrived to thwart Mister Crane’s little field trip, someone  _is_  already here.

Whoever it is, they’re good. You’ll give them that. If only the person they’d tried to scoot past hadn’t slid their shoe along the tiled floor. It prompts you to glimpse in that direction and you twist around, throwing out a forcefield without hesitation. A figure clothed in black dives out of the way, so it hits the counter.

He doesn’t hesitate either, and the knife he throws whistles through the air. You raise your arm in a motion to block it, and a larger forcefield forms. The knife bounces off your makeshift shield, which pulses with the strength of the impact, and it falls with a clatter. You bend down to pick it up, but before you can throw it back, he’s thrown another. You start moving then, making yourself a harder target to hit, and seek cover.

You exchange blows, the screams of anyone who nearly gets hit only background noise. You’re careful to keep yourself between your opponent and the door leading to the back where the vault is. Killing him was a secondary goal. First and foremost, you had to stall long enough for Mister Crane to get what he needs.

There’s the faraway noise of cop cars rushing down the road to the scene, and as if on cue, Mister Crane emerges once more, the teller he’d gone to the vault with kept close via an arm around her neck. He drags her out the door towards the getaway car—an armored truck that screeches to a halt on the curb. The masked man you’re fighting is poised to turn his focus to Mister Crane, but you interrupt him and draw his attention back to you.

You keep track of Mister Crane’s position in your peripherals so you know when to make a break for it. But one second of distraction is all the man before you needs, for as you spare a glance out the window, a knife embeds itself in the spot just beneath your clavicle. You yelp, and the forcefield in your hand fizzles out as you stare down at the knife protruding from your body.

He moves fast, but you move faster. You don’t take the time to pull the knife out, instead grabbing the first one you’d stopped that you had placed in your pocket, and without bothering to aim, for it wasn’t really necessary, you fling it in the direction of a few people huddled together on the ground. Forced to decide between stopping Mister Crane or saving the hostages, the man opts for the latter, as you’d expected.

His own period of distraction is enough for you to run outside, Mister Crane’s head peeking out of the back to urge you to hurry. The teller he’d used for a shield is on the ground, shoved there when he’d jumped into the truck and too in shock to move. Your fingers curl around the knife still in your body and pull it free with a growl. You drop it as you join Mister Crane, and he slides the door shut as the truck speeds down the street.

Diego throws the doors back and curses when he finds you’ve escaped. He spots the bank teller still on the sidewalk, and he jogs over to her. “Hey, are you okay?” he asks gently.

She shakes her head and he sighs deeply. Of course she isn’t. Poor girl had her life on the line. No one would be okay after something like that. There would no doubt be an ambulance accompanying those police cars. They’d help her better than any soothing words from him could.

His discarded knife glints under the sun, and he goes to pick it up. Rather than red staining the blade, there’s blue. He furrows his brows in confusion but doesn’t have time to think much about it, at least not right now. The increasing volume of sirens breaks his train of thought and reminds him that the priority is to leave the scene before the cops show up.

He’s two blocks away and making his own escape via the rooftops by the time they get to the bank. By then, all that’s left is damage to be assessed, scared men and women to check on, and a vault a whole lot emptier than it had been at eight o’clock this morning.

———

At 9:43 PM, Diego is mopping the floors of the boxing gym, but his mind is elsewhere. When he’d heard about the bank robbery on the police scanner, he hadn’t been too worried about taking care of it, even if a big heist like that warranted multiple criminals. It would leave him outnumbered, but his knives always made up the difference. As such, he’d been surprised to discover there were only two people inside (the third one, the getaway driver, was offsite, for Diego hadn’t seen the truck parked outside when he got there). It would’ve been easy to become overconfident and go in guns blazing (not  _technically_ , but the point still stands), but he’d been right to continue to play it safe, and on top of that, be even more cautious.

The gravity of the situation didn’t give him a lot of time to study you completely. He had to act fast. What he noticed first were blue sparks flittering around your hand, dancing around your fingertips and swirling in your palms. He might have owed it to a weapon, something new and something dangerous, but you were clearly not holding anything. It stopped him short for a moment. He didn’t know what would happen if you attacked, and therefore had no way to prepare. But he continued pressing forward. His original plan held: get rid of you quickly and quietly.

Well, it held for about three seconds anyway. He shushed the people who spotted him, bringing his index finger up to his lips, and crept ahead. He was halfway to you when someone nearby moved. The motion alerted you, and he wasn’t thinking as he immediately dodged whatever you’d thrown at him. He watched it hit the counter behind him and disappear, and he turned to you to see the sparks had formed discs. Briefly he wondered what they could be, but when you block one of his knives with a larger disc that stretches to match the length of your forearm, he figures it out. Forcefields.

This realization is already plenty of food for thought. No one just  _had_ forcefields. It wasn’t an ability that could be learned. There were no tools to make it possible. No, there had to be a natural ability, a natural affinity for them. He connects the dots fast, not that it was difficult, and the conclusion he draws he gives no voice to. It almost seems unnecessary to put it into words. The heaviness which settles in the pit of his stomach serves as evidence for the recognition of what you are.

But in the same instance of acknowledging that, his stomach then starts to turn, a motion of discomfort like he’s eaten something bad or he’s experiencing motion sickness. Because you being what you are, and you having the powers that you have, you choose to do  _that_. You put others in danger. While you hadn’t killed anyone at the bank, he doesn’t doubt that you would, if you were presented with the opportunity. The burn of ferocity in all your movements (and in your eyes, he’s sure, if he could see them) as you fought eliminated any of his would-be skepticism. The fact is simple: you’re bound by the leash your boss keeps you tethered with, but if he let it go slack, you’d charge ahead with snapping jaws eager for blood. Cynically, Diego thinks perhaps your boss is saving that for another day. Dogs left to starve rip and tear all the more savagely when finally let loose.

Eudora’s told him over and over to keep his distance from police investigations. And it’s not as if he’s ever really  _listened_  (how  _could_  he ignore all those calls for help on the scanner?), but he sure as hell can’t let this case drop. Based on what he saw today, he knows the cops are outmatched. You’re one of a very rare forty-three, and Diego almost feels responsible for subduing you. Maybe it could be taken as the urge he always gets to catch criminals and make the world just a little bit safer, and that’s certainly part of it, but there’s a sense of obligation here too. As much as he wants to distance himself from you, he can’t deny that at the root of the matter, you and he are the same. It’s what puts him on level ground with you, gives him a better fighting chance than most others.

The only thing that confuses him is the blood on the knife he hit you with. Were there others born that same day with blood like yours? Diego’s only ever known six others aside from you, and as far as he knew, all of them had red blood like him. Was it even blood?

“That spot’s looking real shiny there.”

Diego blinks and looks up from his task to see Al exiting his office. That’s when he notices that he had indeed been mopping the one area for the past few minutes, caught up in his thoughts as he was. “You workin’ late?”

“Yeah, had some things to finish up.” Al waves a hand dismissively and shrugs on his coat as he makes his way to the front doors. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Diego.” He tosses one last wave over his shoulder.

Diego grins and holds his hand up in goodbye, though he knows Al can’t see it. “Bye, Al. Have a good night.”

Diego wishes  _he_  had a good night. His sleep is restless, plagued with images of you and that gas mask. You’re fighting again but this time you successfully hit him, and the gash seers hot with pain. He brings a hand up to the wound, applying pressure to stem the flow of blood. The gush is so strong it seeps through the cracks of his fingers, but he doesn’t see red. He sees blue. His eyes widen and he doesn’t know what’s going on. More sparks flutter in your hands, looking for a target. He tries to kick his own body into gear, to fight back, to do  _something_ , but it’s not cooperating, and he’s unable to throw any knives. As he checks all the belts on his person, he finds he had none to begin with.

_We’re the same, aren’t we?_ The question echoes ominously, like you’re in his head. Your own tilts to the side. A picture of fake innocence and genuine mockery.  _Though I was hoping for someone who could put up a good fight…_

_Get out_ , he growls. His hand has returned to the injury in his chest.  _Get out of my head_. His fingers curl and his nails dig into his skin, but the sting is secondary, easily ignored in favor of the ugly laceration you’ve dealt and that you’re now appraising like a work of art. Your work of art. And you raise your hands, forcefields at the ready, to add the finishing touches.

_You’re my magnum opus, Diego. You should be honored_.

These words cause him to pause. You know his name? That’s impossible. When would you have…

Then it clicks, and he grows conscious suddenly that this isn’t real. This is a dream. And he assumes that would remove some of the tension, but it’s difficult to ignore the burn of his wound which feels too real and makes him think his life  _is_  currently hanging in the balance. Maybe this dreamed up version of you can tell that he’s figured out, but you’re nonplussed, perhaps because you know that even still, a tiny part of him is convinced this is very much real life, and it’s this which puts you at an advantage.

You throw out more forcefields, edges sharp as his own blades, and he’s helpless to defend himself. But it’s fine, he thinks. He won’t die. He might die in the dream but all that would do is wake him up.

Right?

…

_Right._

His eyes shoot open and he gasps, a deep intake of breath as though wanting to assure himself that he  _is_ alive. His fingers claw at his chest instinctually to check for injuries, but he feels nothing but the pounding of his heart. He closes his eyes and swallows hard, trying to calm down. But closing his eyes isn’t a good idea because then he’s just seeing you in that damned gas mask again.  

The first light of sunrise is peeking in through the window, and Diego has never been so thankful. He sits up, prepared to get an early start on the day. There’s no way he can go back to sleep.

———

Contrary to what Diego first thought, the vault at the bank hadn’t been emptied of most of its contents. Rather, most of it remained untouched. According to the news, the only safety deposit that had been broken into was that of Ulysses Ferdinand. Upon hearing this name, Diego’s brows furrow. He’d heard that name before.

The anchor continues on, answering Diego’s unspoken question. Ulysses Ferdinand is a scientist who had been kidnapped three months ago. His whereabouts are totally unknown, but authorities were conducting their own search. Diego had begun one as well, when cops and private investigators appeared to be coming up empty-handed, but he hadn’t had much luck either. This is the first piece of information anyone has received regarding what happened to him.

A commercial break begins, and Diego huffs, deep in thought, as an infomercial about a blender plays on the screen. What was in Ferdinand’s safety deposit box? And how did he connect to you and the man you work for?

This revelation motivates him to work harder on this kidnapping than he had before. He actually has clues about this case that he can build on, and he can work his way to you that way. Currently, anything about you or the man you were at the bank with is up in the air, and any assumptions are mere guesses.

The following week, Ferdinand’s name is all over the news. Again. His name is well-known in the scientific community, and when it was first brought to light that he was missing, it was the only topic on every news channel. Everyone wondered how he could’ve disappeared. Everyone wondered why. Speculations ranged anywhere from plausible to downright ridiculous. Diego half-listened to some of them, but for the most part, wrote off the majority as not worth his time.

With the latest news, however, the theorizing has started up once more. Diego resumes with his investigation and with his half-listening, television on low volume and police scanner standing on his dresser. This case wasn’t his own focus, simply the biggest one. He still responds to calls he overhears, of home burglaries or convenience store robberies. But he’s still on edge with every dispatch, prepared to hear of something substantial, something that could only mean you were involved. He gets no such alerts.

What he does get, four weeks later, is a breakthrough on Ferdinand’s potential location. He’d done a lot of questioning of a lot of shady people, and he knows he’s ahead of the authorities on this one. Things move quicker for him since he gets his answers using methods which are none-too-nice. There are no rules he has to follow, just a goal to get to. And apparently, that goal is on the far side of town.

When Diego looks up at the old building, abandoned and crumbling, he can’t help laughing a bit. This seemed…  _too_ obvious. He treks inside through the front, where one door is missing. His boots crunch quietly over broken glass, and he tries to tread lightly in case anyone is lying in wait to ambush him. But as far as he can tell, this whole floor is empty. It’s getting dark, and in the last slivers of light, he approaches an elevator.

As soon as he presses the button to call the lift, there’s a ding and the metal doors part. The inside is similarly roughed up as the rest of the structure, and it groans and creaks as it lowers, down into the sub-basement. It occurs to Diego that it will ding when it reaches that floor, and he sincerely hopes no one is nearby to hear. His job would be easier if he could avoid conflict for as long as possible, and get an accurate scope of the situation. If he finds Ferdinand here, he’d prefer to sneak him out if he could. Fighting while trying to keep someone alive at the same time is a challenge, and while he likes a challenge, he’s smart enough not to risk it.

There’s the inevitable ding of the elevator as it sputters to a stop, and as the doors open, Diego gets low, searching for cover in case anyone is there. In contrast to the ground floor, the sub-basement is like a science fiction novel come to life, like a glimpse into the future. The air is cold and sterile, and terminals with various readouts line the wall. Workbenches are littered with tools and pieces of paper, on which are scrawled sloppy equations and diagrams. This is where Ferdinand is supposed to be?

The lab appears to be empty, so Diego stands back up. He surveys the lab, a knife in each hand. His eyes vigilantly comb the room both to look over all the tech and to make sure no one is hiding in the shadows. The farther he moves into the room, the more he wonders if that quack on channel seven might’ve been correct—that Ferdinand had disappeared of his own accord, entirely on purpose.  _To work on something top secret_  is what the man had said. And he would emerge when he was done, to share his work with the world. Why he would need to go underground to carry out his research ( _literally_ , Diego muses) no one could say, not even the originator of the hypothesis. It just sounded like a load of bull, and Diego knows he wasn’t alone in thinking that.

But now…

Is Ferdinand not actually in any distress? If it were true, if he dropped off the grid to work here in peace, that would wrap up one case but lead him to a dead end on another. He’d been so confident Ferdinand’s disappearance was related to you, but if he was wrong, he’ll have gotten nowhere with you. He’d have to start from scratch, scrounging up clues and evidence and who knows how long that could take? His intention was to find you before you could do anymore harm, but his doubts now about what seeing this lab could mean are causing him to worry that the next time he’ll hear anything about you is when you commit your next big crime.

He turns the corner into the next room, where there’s another workbench in the center. But this one isn’t full of tools and blueprints. There’s someone laying on it. He walks over carefully to get a better look, and as the face comes into view, he exhales steadily.  _Speak of the devil._ He doesn’t recognize you at first, since you wore a gas mask. What tips him off is a small suture by your collarbone that matches the color of your skin but is slightly raised. It matches the width of his knives.

In this state, you hardly seem dangerous. Your face is relaxed, your chest rising and falling slowly. There are no blue sparks to be had at the tips of your fingers, but they twitch like you’re trying to form forcefields subconsciously. Diego’s eyes narrow as he takes you in, and they settle on your left forearm, the skin of which is pulled back, revealing intricate wiring and small blinking lights.

_What the hell?_  He’s no stranger to technology like this, to robots. Mom was one. But what differentiates you from Mom is your ability to use forcefields. A power like that couldn’t be instilled into a human, much less an android. Something like that had to be natural. Yet he’d watched you use them, and the stitching in your skin confirmed that it was you at the bank. Were you what Ferdinand has been working on? That would make him responsible for what happened at the bank. Had he been the other masked figure you were with?

Diego decides that while he would like to know the answer to these queries, this isn’t the right time to be mulling them over. There isn’t anyone else in the lab with him, but it might not stay that way for long. He has to work fast.

Producing a knife from his belt, he twirls it so the tip points downwards. He stands by your head and aims the blade at your torso. It would be simple: stab it into your chest, and drag downwards. He had to damage as much of the circuitry as possible. So his grip tightens on the handle, and he purses his lips, readying himself. Before he can bring it down, however, there’s the sound of rushed footsteps and a yell: “NO! What you  _doing_?!”

Diego looks up. A man with wire-frame glasses and a wild mess of white hair is on the other side of the room, eyes wide and breathing quickly in panic. He resembles all the pictures online and on the back of all his books, so alike that it’s unmistakeable. Ferdinand.

“Did you make her?” Diego questions. His hand is still suspended in the air, knife trained on you. “She’s a  _criminal_.”

Ferdinand sputters, clearly understanding that Diego is correct but trying to spit out a reason for why he shouldn’t kill you. His mind is running a mile a minute, and it takes him a moment to be able to put the words together. There better be a good reason. “I know, I know, but… she’s my creation. S-She’s special—”

Diego hums skeptically. “Yeah, not helping your case here.”

“She’s capable of more than all that!” Ferdinand rushes out, like if he doesn’t speak fast then it’ll be too late. “That… killing, that  _soullessness_. Her lack of empathy was programmed, and I can reverse it.”

“Why would you program her like this in the first place?”

“I had no choice. Please. I’ll explain everything after you put the knife down.”

Diego hesitates for a moment, gaze sliding from Ferdinand down to you and back again. You’re still breathing deeply, but you’re not asleep, not technically. Your systems are idling presumably because Ferdinand had been working on you. He knows you aren’t waiting to spring a surprise attack the moment he puts his knife away, but he’s unsure if Ferdinand would try wake you up. He wants to believe he won’t, and whereas before he would’ve trusted Ferdinand weren’t at fault, to find that he was the one who built you… Diego can’t be blamed for his suspicion.

He spares one more glimpse towards the scientist, who watches him closely in turn. He’s the picture of a mad scientist with his crazy hair but the look in his eyes doesn’t match. What he says isn’t sprouting from insanity. He knows exactly what he is saying. His desperation is clear. He cares for you, and he wouldn’t risk anything that would result in you being turned to scrap metal.

With a heavy sigh, Diego tucks his knife away. Ferdinand visibly relaxes, shoulders drooping, and walks to the terminal next to the workbench you lay on. “Thank you.”

Diego grunts and stares at Ferdinand’s hands as they fly over the keyboard. “How did you end up here? The cops have been looking for you for months.”

Ferdinand doesn’t respond immediately, though Diego’s not certain if it’s because he’s focusing on the screen in front of him or because he doesn’t know what to say. Finally, he speaks. “I was kidnapped by a man who calls himself Mister Crane. [Name] was already with him, on the brink of death. He wanted me to fix her.”

“[Name]?” Diego glances down at you.

“Yes.” Ferdinand nods. “[Name] [Last Name]. She was in a car crash three months ago.”

“What did Mister Crane want with her?” Diego has a feeling he knows exactly why, but he wants it confirmed.

“I think what you saw during that bank robbery is enough for you to figure out why.” Ferdinand flashes Diego a small grin, but it’s mirthless. He turns back around. “She was— _is_ —a very special person, with the things she can do. Her ability is reminiscent of those of the Umbrella Academy, from all those years ago.”

And there it is. Diego did have that underlying instinct that you and he were alike, but it still comes as a shock for it to be affirmed by an outside party. It confirms to him that he wasn’t imagining it, trying to draw connections that didn’t actually exist, in a search for others like him. All his life, he had wondered who else was out there, what their powers were and what they were doing with them. He and his siblings were trained to be crime fighters, but that couldn’t necessarily be the case for the remaining thirty-six. Maybe some hadn’t honed their skills, letting them lie dormant beneath the surface while they carried on completely normal lives. Maybe some really were like him and his brothers and sisters, using their powers for good. He always hoped no one would use them for evil, but now that he’s older, he understands that’s too much to hope for.

“Mister Crane wanted her like this?” Diego asks. “Without feelings? Without a… a moral compass?”

Ferdinand nods. He grabs a couple of wires and reaches over to connect them to the hubs in your opened forearm. “He wanted to use her to forward his plans, and figured it easier to control her that way.” Evidently, he can see Diego itching to ask for elaboration on this point, but he skips over it. “There will be more time to expound later, but first, we must move quickly. I don’t know when Mister Crane will return.”

A quiet buzzing emits from the terminal, and Diego keeps silent so Ferdinand can focus. He occupies himself by studying you, and the cords protruding from your arm. This explained why your blood was blue. You aren’t human, not  _entirely_ , not anymore. And it makes perfect sense why it was Ferdinand that Mister Crane kidnapped. Ferdinand’s papers gained traction because of his work on cyborg enhancements. There was no one more fit for this type of work than him.

You truly did look harmless laying on the workbench, the farthest thing from a monster, and that’s because you were. This hadn’t been your fault. For all Diego knows, you had been one of the other thirty-six who chose to leave your ability alone. You were probably under the radar, and would have remained there successfully if Mister Crane hadn’t found you and taken your near-death experience as an opportunity to twist you into a weapon.

In the past, Diego might not have seen that as a reason to excuse what you’ve done. He might have instead reasoned you could do it all again. But he’s matured over the years, and he knows that wouldn’t be fair to you, if he snuffed you out without giving you second chance. And if you were just a normal girl (well, as normal as you can get for being able to use forcefields anyway), surely that part of you was still in there somewhere. Besides, Ferdinand appears to genuinely care for you and your wellbeing, and if he has faith that you can come back from this, Diego does too.

Another several minutes pass before Ferdinand pulls the cords out and replaces the cover on your forearm. The edges of the piece of metal blend in until it’s impossible to tell there’s anything there other than skin. “It’s finished. She’ll wake up in a few hours.”

Diego nods determinedly. “All right. Then let’s get going.” Carefully, he scoops you up, one arm placed beneath your back and the other in the bend of your knees. Your head hangs limp as he carries you along. As he follows Ferdinand to the elevator, he spots your gas mask on a workbench. He leaves that behind. You’d have no use for it anymore.

Luckily, they get out with no trouble. Mister Crane is still gone. As Diego pulls out of the lot, Ferdinand lets out a deep breath of relief, slumping against his seat. You’re laying in the back, out like a light. “Thank you,” Ferdinand says simply. The stress of being held captive all those months are finally catching up to him, and Diego notices that he sounds and looks more tired than he had been when he saw him in the lab. “And thank you for giving [Name] a chance.”

“You’ll need to leave town,” Diego decides. “It’s too dangerous for you to stay while Mister Crane is here. I’ll bring you to the bus station.”

“I have no complaints about that. I have family a couple of states over who I’m sure will be glad to see me. Though I imagine they’ll be wondering why I don’t have any bags.” Ferdinand still has the energy to emit a quiet chuckle.

It’s quiet for a while as Diego drives down the highway. It had been getting late when he went to the abandoned building, and at this time, the roads are nearly deserted. He’s glad for that. Operating under the cover of night was most advantageous, and Ferdinand could get out of the city without risk of many eyes spotting him.

He only speaks when he takes the off-ramp and comes to a stop at the red light. “What did Mister Crane steal from your safety deposit box at the bank?”  
  
Ferdinand’s eyes had slid closed, and it looked as though he were asleep, but evidently he was just resting them, for at this question, they open again. He looks over at Diego, then sticks his hand in his pocket, fishing for something. He produces a small USB drive. It’s the shape of a key, colored gold with an ornate bow. “All my research on cybernetic enhancements is on this flash drive. What I did for [Name] I was able to do without it, but when Mister Crane demanded more androids—built from scratch, mind you, and not a hybrid like [Name]—I couldn’t do it without this.”

Diego’s brows furrow. “He wants an army?”

“He does. I’m not sure what sort of nefarious deeds he intended to commit. While none of them would be as powerful as [Name], since she has abilities none of them would have, they could still win out with brute strength and numbers.”

“Did you build any?”

“Just one. I tried to work as slowly as possible, but I could only keep that up for so long before Mister Crane became suspicious. It’s just a prototype, but don’t let that name fool you. It’s fast, fluid, and strong. I would be prouder of it, to see some of my research become reality, but, well, the circumstances aren’t the  _greatest_ …”

“But you have [Name].”

At this, Ferdinand smiles. A genuine one. “Yes. You’re right.”

Diego’s car is one of two cars in the bus station lot, the other most likely belonging to the nighttime attendant. He pulls up to the curb and Ferdinand gets out, shutting the door as Diego lowers the window on that side. Bending down with forearms braced on the sill, he says, “Thank you again.” And then his eyes flicker over to you. “What will you do with [Name]?”

Mimicking Ferdinand’s motion, Diego turns his head to watch you.“I’ll take care of her. Just focus on getting out of here and getting somewhere safe.”

Ferdinand holds a hand out, and Diego shakes it firmly. He stands up straight and retreats inside, and Diego stays where he is as he watches the scientist approach the counter. After he purchases his ticket, he looks out the bus station windows and throws up one last wave.

Because it’s so late, Diego is able to bring you in through the front doors of the boxing gym. Holding you and looking for his keys in his pocket is a little difficult, but he manages. It’s pitch black inside, and he automatically reaches to his right to switch the lights on. He left before the gym was closed, which means there’s still cleaning to be done, but he’d return to do that later (granted, if he doesn’t fall asleep first).

He sets you gently down on his bed, then plops down in the chair against the wall. The only part of his outfit he bothered to take off were the belts with his knives, but he was too tired for much else. He teeters on the edge of consciousness, and spends those few minutes staring at you sleeping, truly sleeping this time. Soon, you’ll be waking up, but not because your system is being activated after being idle. You’ll wake up because the sun is rising, and you’ll be ready for another day. In this moment he could swear that you are human. Entirely so.

———

By the time Diego wakes up, the gym is already open. Panic washes over him when he’s jarred to consciousness by the sound of people chatting and setting up equipment. He hadn’t done any of the cleanup. Usually there’s never any big mess, but he always did some form of upkeep regardless. However, it seems Al had no complaints about the state of the gym, for he hadn’t knocked. A stroke of luck, considering you’re in here.

His eyes slide over to you. You’re stirring slightly, brows furrowed like you’re attempting to ignore the bustling outside. But it only gets livelier, and soon, your own eyes open, and it’s the first time he’s seeing them.

As you sit up, he asks, “Hey, how do you feel?”

[Eye color] eyes blink the sleep away and find him a few feet away in the chair. He sits up straighter as well, and barely suppresses his groan from the stretching of his spine. Sleeping upright like this was  _not_ good for his body, and his neck feels strained too. “Um… fine, I guess, but… who are you?”

“My name’s Diego.”

Your sights are trained on him, cogs spinning in your head as you process the information. You avert your gaze to the table where his belts are, and spot the knives in them. It all rushes back to you then, the crimes you committed and what you’ve done to the man before you. “Oh.”

Diego notices your expression of recognition.“Do you remember it?” He doesn’t specify, but you don’t need him to.

You nod forlornly, not bothering to meet his eyes. You almost can’t bring yourself to, knowing you’d fought him weeks ago, fully prepared to kill him if he got in your way. In fact, three weeks ago, you were fully prepared to kill anyone you had to. You hadn’t felt anything at the prospect of doing it, yet now, the guilt is overwhelming. In the months you had been under Mister Crane’s control, you painted your hands red. It was too late to take any of that back. But the thought that you would have continued doing so, a mindless machine, is what prompts the shame to bubble in your stomach.  

“I remember it all,” you whisper.

Diego sighs. You look so tiny, curling into yourself as memories of your wrongdoings flood back. He could tell you that it wasn’t you, not  _really_ , but it wouldn’t be a good enough answer. It was your hands, your powers, that did those things. And separating yourself from your abilities was impossible. They’re part of you. He understands that, perhaps better than anyone. So he changes course, preemptively answering a question he’s sure you were bound to ask.

“Ferdinand reprogrammed you to give you your thoughts and feelings back,” he states.

You instantly look up at hearing Ferdinand’s name. “Is he okay?”

“He is. He took a bus, left town. Hiding out until this all blows over.”

“Good.” You try to smile but only manage a small, emotionless upturn of the corner of your mouth. You’re glad to hear he’s safe, but you’re still weighed down by what you went through. This is the first time you’ve been aware of right and wrong in months, and having to assess everything you’ve done in the space without your moral compass makes you unable to muster up any sort of sincere grin.

“We’re gonna stop Mister Crane, you and me,” Diego states. At this resolution, you meet his gaze, and he holds it to make sure you know he means it. It’s a promise, and he hopes you can see that in his eyes.

You take a deep breath. “Okay.”

There is a silver lining to you retaining your memories, and it’s that you remember Mister Crane’s scheme. He had a grudge against the mayor. The details of this he never divulged, but you gathered that the mayor wronged him in some way when they were younger. And that’s why he wanted the androids. Enough at his disposal to prove his power, and to exact his revenge. He planned to attack during the mayoral speech in front of city hall, ensuring as many eyes as possible were on him, and were around to witness the humiliation of a longstanding rival.

You mention offhandedly that despite it seeming wrong, you feel bad for Mister Crane.  _It’s screwed up, I know_ you say, and you laugh a little at the ridiculousness of it but Diego doesn’t think it’s ridiculous at all. It’s incredible the level of sympathy you exhibit, and he can’t believe it could even  _be_  stifled. You’re bursting at the seams with compassion and no one is out of reach, not even the one who’d taken those emotions from you. This is who you were, before Mister Crane, before your accident. This is who you  _are_.

You’ve told him your story about growing up with your ability. You never did much with your forcefields until recent years. You didn’t actively seek out trouble ( _Not like you_ ,  _Diego,_  you remark with a smile) but if you came across it, you’d step in. You don’t have the formal training Diego does as consequence of being in the Umbrella Academy, but you handle your powers well enough.

He can hardly detect the person he confronted during the bank robbery when he looks at you. He recalls vividly the dark visor of your gas mask, reflecting his face and the destruction you wrought. It acted as a barrier, stealing away your humanity and fulfilling Mister Crane’s vision for what you should be, and were to him: nothing but a machine. With the mask fallen away and the figurative veil over your eyes lifted, that ghost in the machine had taken a breath of fresh air, long suppressed.

Truth be told, he can’t say he’s very certain the forcefields were your only power. That benevolence spilling from your heart, too big to be contained, made a good case for itself. Perhaps on October 1, 1989, whatever higher beings that had caused the anomaly of those special forty-three children had also decided to bestow you with all the goodness to keep the world turning.

An announcement is made on the morning news that the mayor is going to give a speech the next day, a routine update for everyone in the city about various public works and amendments. Your face as you watch the television with crossed arms is grave.

“Think Mister Crane is going to be there?” Diego asks.

“He wanted to have an army of androids at his disposal to confront the mayor,” you begin, “but I think he’ll go through with it even without one. That prototype Ferdinand developed is incredibly strong; I’ve seen it in action. It’d still give the police a run for their money.”

“Then we’ll be there waiting for him. We can keep to the periphery, where we can’t be seen. If he’s a no-show, no one at city hall is any wiser and we get out of there.”

In the days leading up to this point, you had expected Mister Crane to search for you. You were always looking over your shoulder for that android of his, sent to pursue you like a dog. But you’ve been left alone, and rather than setting you more at ease, it serves to make you more tense. There was purpose in his not coming after you, and you wracked your brain for what it could be. Now with the knowledge that the mayor’s speech is tomorrow and you’ve had no signs of your former employer attempting to find you, you’re confident you’re about to walk into a trap.

You voice these concerns to Diego as you sit down on his bed, the mattress bouncing beneath you. He’s at the table sharpening his knives but he’d been listening to every word.

“I can’t think of any kind of trap he might have. Without Ferdinand and his tech, he doesn’t have much in the way of surprises.”

“Maybe I’m paranoid, but I was just so sure he’d come after me, and since he hasn’t…”

“Don’t write off a gut feeling,” he tells you. “We’ll exercise more caution tomorrow. Watch our backs more closely.”

When the next day rolls around, you’re outfitted similarly, clothed fully in black. The speech begins in an hour, and you pick nervously at the hem of your long-sleeve. Your fingertips are buzzing, a familiar sensation when you’re anxious, small sparks threatening to flicker to life. It’s your fight or flight response encouraging you to form forcefields to defend yourself, and prepare for a battle.

Diego is rummaging in the dresser but you’re not paying attention, instead watching the morning’s stock market segment without really processing any of what’s being said or what’s shown on the screen. A small banner running along the bottom shows a reminder about the speech.

A small hum of victory leaves Diego’s mouth once he finds what he’s looking for. There’s a pause, and in your periphery you catch him glancing at you before he dives back into the contents of the drawer. Your fingers tingle again, and you consider redoing your ponytail for the fifth time to alleviate the sensation and give them something to do that didn’t involve forcefields. Just as the news cuts to a commercial break, Diego slides the drawer closed and approaches you.

“Here. You can’t leave your face exposed.”

You turn your focus to Diego to see he’s already wearing his mask. Then your eyes slide lower to the object he’s holding out. While his own domino mask is angular with more rounded points, the one he’s giving you has longer edges on both sides, with tapered tips at all four corners so that they resemble wings. Gingerly, you take it from him, running your thumb over the smooth material.

“I got it a while ago, but didn’t think it suited me much.” He chuckles. “Good thing I held onto it, huh?”

You stand, turning over the mask and putting it on. It fits snugly to the contours of your face, and you angle your head to look at yourself in the mirror up against the far wall. When you smile, you can actually see the curve of your lips. Staring into the mirror, you recognize that what stares back  _is_ you. Unlike with the gas mask, some of your features remain exposed, a reminder that you  _are_ human, like Diego, like Ferdinand, like all the people you want to keep safe from here on out. The notion of humanity cared not for the circuitry that comprised your being.

“Yeah,” Diego comments, appraising you as well, and approving with a nod. “It suits you a lot better.”

The two of you sneak out to Diego’s car via the back exit. On every street, your eyes are scanning left and right, checking the sidewalks and the cars waiting for their turns at the intersection. You didn’t fully expect for Mister Crane to confront you before the mayor’s speech, since there’s no doubt it would cause a ruckus, and word of the impending danger would prompt the police to cancel the event and bring the mayor somewhere safe. No, if Mister Crane wanted to deal with you, he would do it at city hall. Two birds with one stone.

A sizable crowd has formed at the base of the white steps, a combination of press, with their microphones and cameras, and regular citizens. A podium with the city’s seal on the front rests on a platform. There are a few council officials already on the small stage, and one of them walks up the podium to share opening remarks.

You find a place to hide in an alley across the street, concealed by dumpsters filled to the brim with trash bags. The smell leaves a lot to be desired, but the important part is that you’re out of sight. Still, Diego can’t help waving a hand in front of his face, a futile attempt to mitigate the stench as his nose scrunches up in distaste. While it’s pungent enough not to be ignored completely, you show no signs of being bothered, too distracted with staring straight ahead. If you’d been skittish on the drive over here, that was nothing compared to now.

Mayor Turner replaces the first politician’s place at the podium, with a thank you and a clap on the shoulder. The speakers that had been set up boom with his voice, carrying along the stretch of street. A couple of police cars are parked on the curb, cops standing by the doors, attention on the crowds in search of anything suspicious.

The tingling at the tips of your fingers has begun again, and Diego is twirling a knife absentmindedly. Both of you are on high alert, prepared to spring into action the instant anything appears off. But before long, the mayor shares his closing comments, then the question and answer segment begins. And nothing else thus far that would merit your intervention.

The lack of any trouble is no grounds to relax, and the distinct silence between you shows you understand that. There may only be ten minutes left, but that’s ten minutes too many to be comfortable. Still, that doesn’t leave much time to get to the mayor, and your eyes narrow. Had you been wrong in your assumptions about Mister Crane’s plan? Is there something else he’s doing?

A gust of wind blows strong enough to ruffle your hair, and you reach up to tame the stray strands in your ponytail. The breeze had also kicked up a fresh wave of the smell of garbage, and Diego recoils.

“ _Gross._ ” It’s the first thing said between you two since you had claimed this place as your stakeout spot.

At the same moment he speaks, the screeching of tires rounding the corner cuts off Mayor Turner in the middle of his sentence. The same armored truck from the bank robbery speeds down the road, not bothering to keep to a lane. The other cars on the road honk and try to veer out of the way, but not all of them are successful. Those that get caught in its path are knocked aside, points of impact crumpling like paper. The truck, however, is none the worse for wear.

It’s heading straight for the steps, and once the crowd there realizes this, they scream and rush to split up. Rather than running into any people, it collides with the empty stage, barreling over the podium. The microphone rings shrilly as it gets jostled, but the sound dies quickly because the speakers get crushed as well.

The rumble of the engine cuts off, and the large door at the back slides up, revealing Mister Crane’s android. His stare is hard as he examines the chaos, looking for his target. Once he spots it, he jumps out and takes heavy, purposeful steps.

The mayor is being ushered towards a car, but the android is catching up quickly. He seems to speed up his pace as he gets closer, and without a moment’s hesitation, you run across the street. Your hand buzzes with a newly manifested forcefield, which you throw ahead of you, in the direction of the android. Instead of colliding with him, it zooms by right in front, forcing him to pause.

When he turns to look at you, you immediately send more his way, keeping him distracted long enough for everyone to get to safety. He has no issue receiving the brunt of your forcefields. There was no flesh for you to cut up; the metal skeleton protected his wiring, and you couldn’t penetrate that. Diego, however, who follows close behind, could. His knives were tangible, with sharp enough points to puncture. A well-placed shot, while perhaps not enough to shut the android down entirely, could slow him down considerably.

The police who were on the scene have drawn their guns and started shooting. The android hardly blinks as the bullets bounce off him and treats them like they’re merely a nuisance.

“Hey, get out of here!” Diego yells to the cops l. He could sense the android was going to go after them, and they had no fighting chance. “It’s not safe!”

As if on cue, the android braces his hands beneath one of the cars on the curb, and hoists it over his head. It creaks precariously as it’s lifted from the ground, yet the one who holds it up hardly looks winded. He flings it across to where the police stand, and they scramble, but before the car can land, you’ve stretched out your arm and encapsulated the vehicle in a translucent blue bubble that floats high above your heads.

You need not argue with the cops anymore than that. They flee, and you try to let the car down as gently as you can. But Diego shouts for you to watch out, and you barely dive out of the way of a wooden barrier hurtling towards you. With your concentration broken, the car falls the rest of the distance and crashes roof-down onto the concrete.

The android is standing by the armored truck, fists clench and eyes trained on you and Diego, prepared to launch another attack. Both of you brace yourselves with feet apart and shoulders squared. You breath heavily, adrenaline coursing through your veins. You’re about to strike when the sound of clapping floats out from the still open door on the truck.

That familiar plague doctor mask comes into view as Mister Crane stands at the edge, boots thudding on the metal. “I planned to make an appearance sooner,” he starts, “but I was having so much fun watching the show.”

He hops out, taking his time as he walks over and comes to a stop next to his android. You can’t see his eyes but you know he’s staring straight at you, cold and calculating. He chuckles and it’s humorless. “Traded one mask for another, I see.” He pauses, as though expecting a response, but you’ve nothing to say, and evidently he knew you wouldn’t, for he continues on. “This would have been a very simple job, if you hadn’t gotten in the way and…  _mucked_ it all up. But no matter. Here’s your chance to redeem yourself: stand down.”

Diego scoffs from your left, clearly not taking it seriously, but you don’t match his feelings that such a request is silly. Mister Crane doesn’t just make supposedly facetious demands. “Why would I do that?” you ask.

Mister Crane claps his hands together once, but the sound is muffled by his gloves. “Ah. Wonderful question.” The android retreats back inside the truck upon his prompting, and there are sounds of a struggle. But the android has no issue dragging a man along with him back out of the vehicle and forcing him to his feet.

It’s the wild mane of white hair that catches your attention first. A piece of cloth tied around his mouth prevents him from saying anything comprehensible, but he’s trying to yell out to you and Diego anyway.

Diego, in particular, is caught more off guard about this. He’d kept in mind what you said about Mister Crane setting a trap, having something up his sleeve to take you by surprise. But he never expected that it could be something like this. “How did you—”

“—find him?” Mister Crane finishes. “Rather than waste my time trying to find [Name], I did something more worthwhile: search for dear Ferdinand. I didn’t do it so he could continue to work for me. Oh no. After what he’s done, I’ve no use for him anymore. No. Now, he’s merely leverage.”

As soon as he finishes this sentence, you know the offer he’s going to make. You feel sick. You don’t want to entertain the question he’s about to present you with. It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. Ferdinand was supposed to be somewhere safe, in hiding, and you and Diego were supposed to stop Mister Crane without harming anybody else. But Mister Crane was a step ahead, figuring out a way to keep you from interfering.

“Allow me to proceed with my plans in peace, and I’ll let Ferdinand go.”

You swallow hard, eyes sliding from Mister Crane over to Ferdinand. He’s shaking his head frantically, and even with the gag, you can tell he’s telling you  _Don’t do it_. Your stomach turns uncomfortably. Of course he would tell you not to. There’s a greater good to fight for, and his death would be minor in the wider scope of things. If let to his own devices, Mister Crane would only kill more. Yet you can’t bring yourself to resist so easily because you know the saying goes  _kill one, save a thousand_ but you want to save everyoneand you hatethat you can’t do that. The fighting wasn’t the difficult part about all this, about being thrown into the fray and stopping evil at the front door. It was the decisions you were forced to make.

Slowly, the forcefields in your hands fizzle out, and when Diego hears it, he turns to look at you. “[Name], you can’t be serious—”

“I’ll stay out of your way.” You ignore him, raising your voice so Mister Crane can hear you. “We both will.”

“Wait—”

“Excellent!” Diego gets cut off a second time as Mister Crane responds. He gives another wordless command to his android, who shoves Ferdinand away. He tumbles to the ground, unable to catch himself since his hands are still bound. He grunts in pain, and as the android rejoins Mister Crane, Diego squashes down any protests he had and focuses on helping Ferdinand, using a knife to cut the rope and pull out the cloth wrapped around his head. He had no idea what the hell you were thinking, but it was your decision, and it was too late to try to reason with you.

With his gag removed, Ferdinand says your name—quietly, but you can still hear him fine. He’s shaking his head again.  _Don’t let them go._  Diego looks over his shoulder at you as well, waiting for what you would do. You don’t respond, not saying anything or nodding or anything that would let him know you even acknowledged what he’s trying to tell you. You’re rooted to the spot, but before Mister Crane and his android can re-enter the truck and proceed with their hunt for the mayor, sparks begin whirring in your palms again and you aim for Mister Crane.

The android is fast, however, and blocks it easily. Mister Crane turns around, shaking his head in mock disappointment, but something tells you he’d known this would happen. “Tsk tsk. We could’ve done this the easy way.”

Diego throws a knife towards the android, who ducks out of its way before running at him. You only have a brief moment to glance over to see Ferdinand has retreated behind the wrecked police car before Mister Crane is on you.

He’s shed his gloves, and your eyes widen to see that in place of human hands, he has fully robotic limbs. They’re clear, allowing you to view the circuitry and the subtle movement of the mechanisms with his motions. Every punch is heavy, kicking up a breeze that you feel every time you dodge.  He probably had Ferdinand give him those enhancements, and you never knew because he always kept his hands covered. In fact, you didn’t know what he looked like at all.

You put up a forcefield to block a hit coming straight for your chest, and it pulsates from the impact, but it’s strong enough to knock you off your feet. You roll to the side as he brings a fist down, leaving a crater in the spot of concrete where your head just was. His strikes come out too quickly for you to find an opening, and you can only do your best to block the onslaught.

In the midst of his struggle against the android, Diego can hear you fighting Mister Crane. He can only spare a glance, but it’s all he needs to know you’re not doing well either. With the brief moment of reprieve he’s afforded when he knocks the android back, he throws a knife in your direction.

The whistle of the blade cutting through the air grows louder as it gets closer. You watch it soar past you, but then, as if remembering where it was suppose to go, it turns back around, flying into Mister Crane’s back.

He cries out in pain, and it allows you the opportunity to retaliate. You charge forward and bring him down to the ground. This pushes the knife in more, and he groans, squirming and trying to reach behind him to pull it out. Your weight atop him prevents him from being able to grab it, and you clench your fist, watching as your forcefield morphs to wrap around your hand, like armor.

It’s your turn to deliver the blows. His mask cracks with every hit, yet you don’t feel any of it. Not even when the eye pieces snap and the glass crumbles. Soon you can see Mister Crane’s face poking through, in the growing fissure of the mask. You note, firstly, that he’s bleeding profusely. His lip is split, and his nose is most likely broken. The second thing you note is his heavily scarred skin, and the particularly large one stretching across his face. His left eye is cloudy, light enough that from a distance it would look entirely white. Purple splotches dot his cheeks, growing darker and angrier with your punches.

He goes slack, too weak to fight you off or continue his efforts to extract the knife, and you’re panting when you finally stop. He’s still breathing, you know that. You had no intention of going so far as to kill him.  

“What—” Mister Crane coughs, and his inhale is scratchy, slow with the amount of effort it requires. “What are you waiting for?”

You hadn’t been looking at him, but you do now, eyes full of contempt. You huff as your heartbeat returns to normal and shake your head, sliding off of him to the ground and landing ungracefully on your haunches. You’re quiet for a few seconds, the silence interspersed with Mister Crane’s raspy breaths. In this space of time, Diego walks over. You hadn’t noticed that his struggle with the android went silent.

“I told myself I wanted to save everyone,” you declare, and this statement is followed by a deep sigh of exhaustion.

Diego stands behind you, staring down at Mister Crane, and purses his lips. He can’t help the swelling of his chest at your words. You had a goal, and you set out to do it. You exercise the self-control he wishes he always had. He knows the hate you have for Mister Crane, and he doesn’t blame you for it. How could he? Yet you hadn’t let it consume you, and if anything, that anger has ebbed away into weariness, and a desire for it to just all be over. And it was now.

He stretches his hand out to you, and your head turns slightly when you see it in your periphery. You take hold of it and he hoists you up. “You okay?”

Diego’s watching you with genuine concern, as he had the day you first woke up at the boxing gym. The heaviness weighing on you feels a little lighter at his inquiry. The rest would be alleviated with rest, and a lot of it. You manage a small smile. “Yeah. I am now.”

From over his shoulder, you can see Mister Crane’s android face down on the ground, a knife sticking out the base of his neck. And you spot Ferdinand, peeking up over the upside down police car to check if the coast is clear. Upon finding that it is, he stands up fully, and you and Diego meet him in the middle. You repeat Diego’s question to Ferdinand, and he too grins in response.

“A little shaken up, but it’ll pass.” You’re about to speak up, but he shakes his head. “There’s no time. Both of you need to get out of here. The authorities will be here soon.”

You don’t seem to want to leave, but Diego gently curls a hand around your forearm, as if to lead you away. “Come on,” he says quietly. You look back at him, then over at Ferdinand, who gives you one last reassuring nod. With a sigh, you acquiesce, allowing Diego to pull you along, back across the street, through the alley, and towards his car. By the time he’s pulling away, you can hear the sirens.

———

As far as anyone else is concerned, the only things Mister Crane had forced Ulysses Ferdinand to do were give him cybernetic enhancements, as well as build an android to do his bidding.

He leaves you out of the picture, and for that, you’d forever be grateful. This kept you out away from any sort of media attention. It also let you do your crime fighting anonymously. If word came to light of your abilities, it would render your mask useless, and if anyone wanted to come after you, it’d be easier to do with a name. Though you’ve had a while to adjust, both to your new body and to using your powers more regularly, you can’t quite believe you’re thinking about it so casually, as though this has always been the state of affairs.

You never anticipated this is where you would end up. Then again, you never anticipated that car crash either. According to Ferdinand, you nearly died, and would have if he hadn’t stepped in. But you can’t resist entertaining the what-if’s. The route your life could have taken is drastically different. The alternative would have been a safer life, certainly, but these days you have no qualms putting it on the line if it meant you could help others. That’s one of the aspects you’ve learned about yourself as a result of what  _has_ happened, and it felt good. You wouldn’t be willing to give that up for the sake of a normal life.

And there are other reasons you’re perfectly happy with the hand you’ve been dealt, and he sits to your left at the bar, head tilted back and taking a giant swig of his third bottle of beer. When Diego sets the bottle down on the bar top, you notice he’s nearly finished it already. You’re still in the middle of your second.

He feels you looking at him and meets your gaze. “What?”

“How do you  _do_ that?” you ask incredulously, pointing at his bottle. “You’re so fast!” You hold up your own to show him how much you have left (never mind being an entire bottle behind) and he laughs.

“Better hurry it up, sweetheart. I’m about to order another round.”

You laugh too and shake your head. The jingle from channel 5 news chimes on the flat screen behind the bar, signaling the end of the commercial break. Ferdinand’s back for another interview today. By this point, the talk and hype about the circumstances of his disappearance have passed, and he’s back on television for the reasons he had been prior to being kidnapped: to discuss his research.

It makes you smile seeing him there, conversing jovially and enthusiastically about his recent discoveries and his plans for the future. The debacle with Mister Crane hadn’t scared him out of the public eye. You, and you’re sure many others, would understand if it had. He’s a prolific scientist in his field, and there’s no doubt these interviews had been why Mister Crane decided to capture him. But he acts as if nothing’s changed.

No, not as if nothing changed. As if it’s water under the bridge. He won’t deny what happened, but it’s in the past now, and there’s no sense lingering on it. The way he’s handling the situation is what you try to follow. He’s bouncing back from it a better person, and you want that for yourself too. You figure you’re doing a pretty job of it so far.

Diego orders another beer for himself, then looks up at the television. “Ferdinand’s hair is wild as ever,” he remarks.

You chuckle, and when the camera cuts back to Ferdinand and you see that crazy mane in its full glory, you set off on another fit of giggles. “Hey, he makes it work.”

“You guys still been e-mailing?”

You nod. You and Ferdinand had begun correspondence fresh off the Mister Crane situation. At the start, most of the contents of the messages were how to calibrate and do repairs on your system. Ferdinand had also promised that his door was always open, if you needed to come in for work that required more specialized tools. But then it shifted from solely technical talk to how you’ve been coping. He gave you what advice he could, able to empathize with you since you’d both been through that fiasco.

“Less and less these days,” you reply. “He’s just been so busy. But I think it could be on  purpose too. You know, helping me along, teaching me to fly, and then letting me go.” You shrug matter-of-factly.

Diego says a quiet thank you to the bartender as he returns with his beer, then smiles fondly at you. Catching his stare, it’s your turn to ask  _What?_  and all he says is, “I’m proud of you.”

You raise a brow but you’re grinning as well. “Thanks, dad.”

He laughs. “Hey, I mean it. The shit you’ve been through… I dunno if I’d be strong enough to still be standing at the end of it.” He brings his beer up to his lips.

“I mean… it helps that I hadn’t been alone.”

Diego sets his drink down, looking at you seriously now. You can see in his eyes that he wants to know what you mean, so you elaborate. “You rescued Ferdinand. You rescued  _me_ , gave me a chance instead of tearing up my wiring and leaving me for dead. Not that I would blame you if you had; I did some pretty awful things. But then on  _top_  of that, you helped me take down Mister Crane. So I think it’s safe to say you are just as strong as I am.” At the end of the explanation, you grin softly.

Seeing your smile prompts Diego’s chest to tighten, almost painfully so. Admittedly, this isn’t the first time it’s happened. Every instance you’ve sent one his way, he felt it. A knee-jerk reaction by now, and he’s not left to wonder what it means. With every passing day he wants more and more just to hold you close and kiss you and if his whole body responds the way it does when he merely seesyour smile…  _Christ_ , he can’t imagine what would happen if he got to feel it, whether against his own mouth or with the pad of his thumb, gently running across the length of your lips and committing the graceful curve of his salvation to memory.

You’re still watching him, and before the seconds stretch too long and become awkward, he laughs quietly. “I always wonder how that’s possible.”

“How what’s possible?”

“To have a heart as big as you do.”

The comment stops you short, and in a rare moment of bashfulness, you look away, suddenly becoming interested in your bottle of beer (still half full). You twirl it around absentmindedly, staring at the condensation dripping along the sides. Diego waits patiently for you to respond, watching your lithe fingers around the bottle, and then your face—the curve of your lashes, the line of your jaw and the smooth column of your neck. The strands of hair too short to be tied back no matter how many times you redo your braid. You turn back to him finally, and he’s afforded a close-up of your eyes, bright and wonderful.

“I’ve got too much love to give. I hope you don’t mind being collateral damage,” you tease. Your voice has lowered in volume due to your proximity, which had been shrinking, and shrinking still.

Diego shakes his head. His gaze flickers down to your lips, and that’s when he knows he’s a goner. “I could never.” And throwing caution to the wind, he leans in the rest of the way.

Farther down the road, he’ll tell you that he used to imagine what it would feel like to kiss you, and that when it happened for real, he wasn’t disappointed, and you’ll laugh, your cheeks warming because he always wants you to know that you had him in your grasp from the beginning, that it was your warm eyes that did him in. But right now, he’s focused on the taste of your strawberry lip balm and he’s being sincere when he concludes the strawberry milkshakes at Griddy’s Doughnuts could never hope to compete with you. His heart twists and he thinks it might explode.

You pull away slightly but remain close enough that your lips brush, and your gaze is half-lidded and he loves you. There’s a commercial playing on the television for a cellular service, an old song from a long gone decade floats through the room from the speakers, and the other patrons of the bar are chatting and laughing and ordering drinks. All of it is background noise, and in these few seconds the world seems to come to a halt.

Then you smile again, dreamy and contented because, he hopes, you’re just as love drunk as he is. And you make the world start turning again.

Later that evening, a call comes on the police scanner regarding a residential break and enter. Nothing need be said as both of you suit up, and as per usual, on the drive over, Diego is trying to toss name ideas your way.

“No, Diego, c’mon, I don’t need one—”

“But why? It would be fun! How about Falcon? Black Falcon?”

“Who would even use it? I thought the whole point of operating at night was so no one saw us.”

“If you ever need to announce who you are.” Diego shrugs.

You roll your eyes, but you’re grinning.

Diego parks far away from the actual location of the house, and you go on foot the rest of the way there, staying away from the street lamps and ducking past houses with their lights on. There are no sounds of a struggle coming from inside once you arrive, and you’re able to take the burglars by surprise. You draw them away from the family they’ve tied up, dispatching them at a safe distance.

When they’re laying incapacitated on the ground, Diego grab his knives back and aids you in untying their captives, cutting ropes and slowly removing the duct tape over their mouths. As he peels back the tape on the father, he says, “Your family is safe now.”

The television is on in the lounge, and when your task is done, Diego walks in to see the breaking news segment that has flashed on the screen. You come in behind him, not quite catching the beginning, but entering just in time to hear the name of the deceased. You aren’t personally acquainted with the one who’s passed, but you still can’t contain your quiet gasp.

“Diego…” you trail off. “I’m so sorry.”

Diego swallows, frozen to the spot, incapable of much movement. But then he simply shakes his head. “Don’t be.” He turns on his heel and walks past you, back to the front door. You stay put momentarily, staring at the portrait of the late Reginald Hargreeves, before you also proceed to make your leave. You give one more reassuring grin and nod at the family, as if to give them the okay to call the cops now. You and Diego would be increasing your distance and getting far away from the scene.

He’s mentioned his siblings before, and their time together as the Umbrella Academy, but he never went into detail ( _That’s a whole other can of worms,_ he’d said). With this news, you know they’ll be returning to town for the wake. He doesn’t seem sad, he doesn’t seem happy, he doesn’t seem anything at the revelation of his father’s death or the prospect of seeing his bothers and sisters after years apart. But you meant it when you said he was strong, and if you got through what you did, he could get through this too.


End file.
